The turning point came on a play that typified the Winnipeg Jets’ night.

Blake Wheeler and Mark Scheifele found themselves on a shorthanded two-on-one in the second period with the Jets trailing the Nashville Predators 1-0.

Wheeler feathered a pass over to the hottest goal-scorer in the NHL playoffs and it looked like a sure goal.

That is, until the puck bounced over Scheifele’s stick and went harmlessly into the corner.

Less than a minute later, P.K. Subban scored his third of the season, on the power play, to give the Preds a 2-0 lead and that was all they’d need in an eventual 2-1 win at Bell MTS Place.

The puck was not the Jets friend on this night, partly because they handled it like a hand grenade and partly because they didn’t have luck on their side, but either way it was common to see it dribbling off sticks, bouncing around in front of the Jets’ net, being passed into a teammate’s skates or being turned over in vulnerable positions.

Those kinds of bounces were simply not going against the Jets in Games 1-3 of this best-of-seven.

There was one other incident that suggested to me this wasn’t going to be the Jets night.

In the first period, there were five Jets players bunched up in front of goalie Connor Hellebuyck. The puck was in their midst and three of them had a chance to bat it out of trouble — glove it to the corner, ice it, kick it somewhere — but nobody could corral it. Well, nobody but the Preds’ Ryan Hartman, who got a stick on it for an unassisted opening goal of the game.

It was an ugly one, just like the final result for the Jets, which looked closer than it really was.

YOUNG GUNS SILENT I liked the way Kyle Connor and Nikolaj Ehlers responded in Game 3 after Jets coach Paul Maurice switched them on the top two lines, but they didn’t look great on Thursday night. Ehlers is still trying to do too much with the puck in the offensive zone instead of taking it to the net and Connor’s most noticeable play was an egregious giveaway in his own zone that led to a Nashville scoring chance.

Those two players, with 60 goals between in them in the regular season, have been too silent for too long … Fans are bewildered by Maurice’s decision to keep Matt Hendricks in the lineup Thursday night when he could have given him a seat in favour of rookie Jack Roslovic.

When Joel Armia was inserted in the game after missing the first three of the series, Maurice chose to take the 21-year-old Roslovic out. That meant 36-year-old Hendricks, a scapegoat for some fans for his performance in a Game 2 loss, stayed in and patrolled left wing on a line with Andrew Copp and Armia.

Here’s the reason: Armia can’t play the left side and neither can Roslovic, at least not at a level Maurice can put trust in. Hendricks likely comes out Saturday, if Mathieu Perreault can return from his mysterious injury, but until then fans are just going to have to accept that Maurice likes what Hendricks has to offer.

PREDS SHOW POWER Give the Predators credit. They played a strong road game, silenced the crowd, got up by a couple of goals and then shut it down, allowing only a late power play goal by Patrik Laine on a shot Nashville goalie Pekka Rinne should have stopped.

Now that’s what a Presidents’ Trophy winning team is supposed to look like and the Preds have their home-ice advantage back in what is now a best-of-three … It seems Peter Laviolette’s strategy was to slow down the game. How else you can you explain him benching Game 2 double overtime hero Kevin Fiala in favour of 36-year-old Scott Hartnell.

Even more baffling: It worked … What a ridiculous fluke it was when Rinne stopped Josh Morrissey with the butt end of his stick in the first period.

Morrissey didn’t get much on the backhand shot but it would have gone in if it hadn’t hit the stick. And here’s the thing: Rinne didn’t even have the stick in his hand at the time — it was essentially standing on end in the crease for a split second after he dropped it. Are you kidding me? What are the odds? … This notion that you have to stand up for your teammates when a player absorbs a hit needs to go out the window in a playoff game, especially when the other team is already getting a penalty.

Mark Scheifele killed a Jets power play in Game 3 and Laine did it in the first period of Game 4, taking a roughing penalty after Scheifele was cross-checked into the boards.

I’m sure teammates appreciate the gesture, but surely they’d rather have the power play … The question was posed to me before the game: Did I think the 8:30 p.m., start would disrupt the Jets rhythm? At first I didn’t think so but now I’m starting to wonder. They were clearly off and the last time they were that out of sorts was when they had a big travel disruption before a Game 3 loss in the first round series against Minnesota.

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